Inside the choking fog, Shun couldn't make out the beast's exact shape, but his system's Ingredient Encyclopedia surfaced a complete dossier:
[Mist-Hidden Lizard] (Mammalian class)
Capture Level: 35
Habitat: Exists only in regions of perpetual, ultra-dense fog; a mid-to-upper-tier predator in that ecosystem.
Length: 4.5 m
Height: 1.8 m
Weight: 3.5 t
Market Price: Steak cuts — 10,000 credits / 100 g.
Whole live specimen (extremely difficult to capture) — non-public auction item.
IGO Valuation: Extremely high; due to the habitat's uniqueness and the difficulty of capture, there is almost no stable market circulation.
[Notes: A powerfully specialized predator adapted to eternal mist. Its surface isn't covered by traditional scales but by an ultra-fine, gray-white integument that modulates with fog density and light, enabling near-perfect blending. Its visual organs have severely regressed—almost no image formation—replaced by an exceptionally developed vibration-sense system.
The limbs and abdomen are studded with hypersensitive receptors that read minute ground tremors from prey movement hundreds of meters away.
Cunning and insidious, it excels at ambush and strikes from concealment, often hunting alone or in small cooperative packs.
Claws and fangs are razor-sharp and carry a special neuroparalytic toxin that quickly robs prey of mobility.
The flesh is firm and delightfully chewy. Because it moves long-term in a special energy environment, its musculature contains a unique "mist-energy." With specialized cookery, it yields a complex flavor where crisp cleanness meets deep, mellow body—one of those legendary wild delicacies spoken of in hushed tones.]
Staring at the entry, Shun felt certainty settle in.
"So that's it—vibration sense plus mimicry… Capture Level 35? Perfect benchmark to test my post-evolution strength."
The corner of his lips lifted. Faced with the fog's invisible assassin, he showed not a hint of retreat.
He calmed his breathing, tuned his body to total harmony with the environment, and waited.
The Mist-Hidden Lizard had the same idea. It had clearly marked Shun and finished its own preparations.
In the near-zero visibility, its musculature drew taut; the grooved, razor talons gave a faint click.
They held position for a heartbeat of silence.
Then the lizard could no longer resist—it lunged.
Shun's Food Honor was already maxed out. He felt the attack coming and slid aside at an uncanny angle.
At the same instant, his hand-blade flashed and chopped down precisely at the most fragile link of its cervical spine.
Crack!
With a soft snap, the lizard toppled without even a scream.
A beast like this—felled in a single move.
Capture Level doesn't only track raw strength; it's inseparable from environment.
Out in open terrain this creature might not even rate a five, but in this habitat, it becomes a nightmare opponent.
Unlucky for it, today's opponent was Shun, master of Food Honor.
The lizard's meat was a rare prize. Shun flicked his right hand and stored the carcass in his system pack.
But just as he finished, he felt it—more tremors, rolling in from every direction.
Companions.
"Five… six… no—eight."
He tallied the number instantly.
Nine hostile life-signs—brimming with killing intent—were converging from all sides. Their footfalls were faint, but to Shun's fully expanded Food Honor, each step boomed like a drum.
Drawn by their comrade's dying signal—or simply by the scuffle—they came the way they knew best: coordinated pack hunt, drowning stronger prey in numbers and fog.
Fanning out, the nine Mist-Hidden Lizards formed a ring, hemming Shun in.
For most intruders here, this was a death sentence.
No wonder Gourmet Hunters so often vanished—these creatures exploited the terrain to perfection.
But Shun was different.
His smile widened, tinged with excitement. "Come on then—let's see whose reading of vibrations is better: yours… or my Food Honor."
He didn't stay rooted. He moved first.
His footwork was cat-light and soundless—he disturbed the fog even less than the lizards did.
He tightened his Food Honor around the ground beneath his soles and the air around his body—sensing not just positions, but the telltales of muscle priming, the instant talons would spring.
The fight erupted at once.
The first wave came head-on and from both flanks—three lizards.
Their maws gaped toward his throat; even in the fog he caught a ghost of their paralytic toxin.
Shun slipped back a half-step at the razor's edge, letting the frontal pounce fly past. Both hands knifed out, pecking lightly at the fore-limb joints of the two flanking attackers.
Crack! Crack!
Two crisp, delicate fractures.
Both lizards' forelimbs twisted; their pounces collapsed into tumbling shrieks as they rolled away, temporarily out of the fight.
The frontal lizard, having missed, barreled forward—its back fully exposed.
Shun wouldn't waste it. He toed off the ground, shadow-close behind it, and hammered a heavy driving strike into the junction of occiput and cervical spine.
Thump!
The third lizard dropped. Three, cleanly resolved.
Shun's motion never paused.
He felt four more rushing from his rear and rear-quarters. This time they'd learned—no lofted leaps. They skimmed low, scything with talons to shred his legs.
Shun moved as if he had eyes in his back. He duck-turned, letting the low scythe pass, and whipped out with twin sweeping kicks like a rising gale—pinpointing the relatively fragile lower jawlines of two attackers.
"Awoo!"
The pair yelped and toppled, skidding out of line.
The last two—canniest of the pack—had been lurking farther out.
They seized the micro-pause in Shun's sequence, and shot in like twin arrows—one high, one low—aimed at his throat and midriff. A killing pincer.
In that split-second, light blazed in Shun's eyes.
"Food Technique · Firm-Cleave!"
—
(End of Chapter)
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